Analysis of poverty, income inequality and their effects on food insecurity in southern Ethiopia

Background: Reduction of poverty and income inequality, and ensuring food security is the main goal of the Ethiopian government. In response, declines of national poverty were observed over time, but it is still a worrying concern as a significant proportion of the population remains poor. However, the trends of income inequality are rising substantially over time and thereby might exacerbate the food insecurity status in the country. This study aims to measure, identify determinants, and analyze the effects of poverty and income inequality on food insecurity status of households in Sawla town of southern Ethiopia. Methodology: A two-stage sampling technique was used to select 227 sampled households’ heads. This study applied descriptive statistics, Foster Greer Thorbecke approach, binary logistic, and quantile regression models to analyze the data. Results: The finds of this study reveals that 34% of households are living below the poverty line with a poverty gap index of 11% and severity index of 5.6%. The average income inequality with Gini coefficient index is found to be 0.447. Both poverty and income inequality result is quite larger than the national average of the country. The sample households are food insecure with 20.7% depth and 13% severity indexes of food insecurity. The levels of poverty and income inequality are more worrisome among the food-insecure households. Moreover, the logistic regression model shows that levels of education, family size, being divorced, the main occupation, savings, and house ownership negatively and significantly affected the household level of poverty. Quantile regression model result shows that age, level of education, income, family size, health, savings, remittances, electric, credit, and house ownership affected households’ level of income of the study area. Conclusion: The study suggests strengthening the existing welfare-oriented strategies by undertaking intra-household resource allocations for women, encouraging participation of diversified business activities, promoting the use of family planning methods, strengthening formal education, microfinance institution and housing program by targeting impoverished households in the town. © 2020, The Author(s).